Obama Silent In the Wake of Egyptian Prez Morsi’s Executive Power Grabs

On Fox News Sunday, Arizona Sen. John McCain called on the President to renounce Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi’s move to seize full control of the country through executive fiat.

“First we must condemn it,” McCain, the ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, told “Fox News Sunday.” “Then we can outline what actions might be taken.”

Morsi announced the power grab Thursday, just one day after he helped broker a cease-fire agreement in Israel between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas in the Gaza strip.

“This kind of power is not acceptable to the United States,” McCain said. “Renounce the statement and the move that (Morsi) just made.”

Rather than condemn the move, the Regime on Friday meekly asked Egypt to adopt a constitution complete with checks and balances.

“We call for calm and encourage all parties to work together and call for all Egyptians to resolve their differences over these important issues peacefully and through democratic dialogue,” said State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland.

Kumbaya.

McCain is requesting a stronger response since “the United State has leverage” in any effort to persuade Morsi to back down because of the billions it gives Egypt in financial aid, as well as forgiving its debt.

“I am waiting to see, I hope soon, a very strong statement of condemnation by the U.S., by Europe and by everybody who really cares about human dignity,” declared Mohamed ElBaradei, who is one of Egypt’s more visible non-Islamist politicians.

So far, no word from the President, but the US Embassy Cairo continued to epically fail on Twitter, as captured by Twitchy:

Wow. As Twitchy reported yesterday, the U.S. Embassy in Cairo somehow managed to get the keys to its Twitter account back, after being thrown under the bus for its disgraceful apologism on September 11. Yesterday, the embassy tweeted, during protests and riots in Egypt that had spread to the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, that the revolution was a “positive step.” Today, the embassy is continuing its pattern of being a textbook example of what not to do. After announcing it was glad that Mubarak is gone, the embassy doubled down on the idiocy.

.@mariafahmy We want to see #Egypt continue to progress toward full democracy without power concentrated in the hands of one person

The full implications of Morsi’s ascendency are not yet apparent. But we can draw a few rather obvious conclusions from these events. The first is this makes the region a much more dangerous place and peace even more unlikely. the second is that the much ballyhooed Arab Spring turned out to be an Islamist triumph, not an opening for democracy. And third, and perhaps most disconcerting for Americans, it looks like the Obama administration has shown itself again to be a band of hopeless amateurs when it comes to the Middle East. While President Obama shouldn’t be blamed for toppling Mubarak, this episode is more proof of the gap between his foreign policy instincts and a rational defense of American interests.

As you can imagine, the media has been all over this story…….(Just kidding…)

Cairo’s streets are filled with demonstrations against Egypt’s president. It sounds awfully familiar, but since the grievances are against an Islamist this time around, don’t expect “the people” to enjoy U.S. support.

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, who came to power as leader of the “civilizational jihadist” Muslim Brotherhood, is besieged with protests from his people after giving himself Pharaoh-like powers that include a ban on challenges to his decrees and the weakening of Egypt’s judiciary.

… Gee, isn’t Morsi a man of the people, personifying the “new beginning” of President Obama’s 2009 Cairo University “apology to Muslims” speech? And didn’t Morsi, just a day before his power grab, become the Peacemaker of Palestine by joining with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in forging an Israeli-Hamas cease-fire?

… Morsi has become just as tyrannical as his predecessor, Hosni Mubarak — except Mubarak was a staunch U.S. ally who maintained peace with Israelis and kept the Mideast powder keg stable for decades, while Morsi so reviles the Jewish homeland he won’t let the word “Israel” pass his lips.

… don’t expect White House press secretary Jay Carney to announce that the Egyptian people’s “grievances have reached a boiling point, and they have to be addressed,” as his predecessor Robert Gibbs did when Mubarak was on the ropes.

And don’t hold your breath for Clinton — or whoever her successor is at the State Department — to call for “an orderly, peaceful transition to real democracy.

… It took 24 hours for Morsi to take advantage of the prestige Obama and his secretary of state handed him. Now he’s using America’s stamp of approval to oppress his own people.

Today marks the fifth day since Morsi’s dictatorial power grab.

Seton Motley of the Daily Caller thinks he may have identified the reason for the Regime’s weak response, thus far:

Morsi also decreed immunity for the Islamist-dominated panel drafting a new constitution from any possible court decisions to dissolve it, a threat that had been hanging over the controversial assembly….

President Barack Obama…blocked a House Republican subpoena of Justice Department deliberations over a botched gun trafficking investigation and set up a potentially explosive political confrontation just as the presidential election heats up.

The votes approved in the Republican-controlled House covered two contempt of Congress citations — one as a criminal matter referring the issue to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington for prosecution, the other authorizing the House to hire a special attorney to bring a civil lawsuit.

The White House today continued to soft-pedal its reaction to the power grab by Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, failing to publicly pressure the Islamist leader to back off from a move toward one-Party rule long feared by those who question to Muslim Brotherhood’s commitment to democracy.

6 thoughts on “Obama Silent In the Wake of Egyptian Prez Morsi’s Executive Power Grabs”

Sort of like ‘still under investigation’. Or when my kids were small and wanted to do something, go somewhere, wanted something that I didn’t want them to do, go or have, but had no real rational answer and wanted to stall, I would say ‘I’ll think about it’.
Same rationale.

Of course he’s silent on Morsi. How can he criticize Morsi when he’s done the exact same thing by Executive fiat, here. He ran a line of crap on his recent Asian tour, calling for a “balanced approach to governing”. What bool*hit, he’s the very last one that is in a position to criticize Morsi. Having said that, I wouldn’t put it past him though. This clown has shredded the US Constitution by legislating by Executive Orders.

He has usurped the US Constitution, Congress, ordered subordinates to ignore the Law, ignored and overruled existing US Laws. . . . . all in a Executive Power Grab. I just can’t wait to find what else he’s going to do in the next four years, as the republican party stands by and plays the see, hear or speak no evil game.